Théophile Gautier says that no one will deny to Berlioz a great
character, though, the world being given to controversies, it may be
argued whether or not he was a great genius. The world of to-day has but
one opinion on both these questions. The force of Berlioz's character
was phenomenal. His vitality was so passionate and active that brain
and nerve quivered with it, and made him reach out toward experience at
every facet of his nature. Quietude was torture, rest a sin, for this
daring temperament. His eager and subtile intelligence pierced every
sham, and his imagination knew no bounds to its sweep, oftentimes even
disdaining the bounds of art in its audacity and impatience. This big,
virile nature, thwarted and embittered by opposition, became hardened
into violent self-assertion; this naturally resolute will settled back
into fierce obstinacy; this fine nature, sensitive and sincere, got torn
and ragged with passion under the stress of his unfortunate life. But,
at one breath of true sympathy how quickly the nobility of the man
asserted itself! All his cynicism and hatred melted away, and left only
sweetness, truth, and genial kindness.
When Berlioz entered on his studies, he had reached an age at which
Mozart, Schubert, Mendelssohn, Rossini, and others, had already done
some of the best work of their lives. Yet it took only a few years to
achieve a development that produced such a great work as the "Symphonic
Fantastique," the prototype of modern programme music.
From first to last it was the ambition of Berlioz to widen the domain
of his art. He strove to attain a more intimate connection between
instrumental music and poetry in the portrayal of intense passions, and
the suggestion of well-defined dramatic situations. In spite of the fact
that he frequently overshot his mark, it does not make his works one
whit less astonishing. An uncompromising champion of what has been
dubbed "programme" music, he thought it legitimate to force the
imagination of the hearer to dwell on exterior scenes during the
progress of the music, and to distress the mind in its attempt to find
an exact relation between the text and the music. The most perfect
specimens of the works of Berlioz, however, are those in which the music
speaks for itself, such as the "Scène aux Champs," and the "Marche au
Supplice," in the "Symphonie Fantastique," the "Marche des Pèlerins," in
"Harold"; the overtures to "King Lear," "Benvenuto Cellini," "Carnaval
Romain," "Le Corsaire," "Les Francs Juges," etc.
As a master of the orchestra, no one has been the equal of Berlioz in
the whole history of music, not even Beethoven or Wagner. He treats the
orchestra with the absolute daring and mastery exercised by Paganini
over the violin, and by Liszt over the piano. No one has showed so deep
an insight into the individuality of each instrument, its resources, the
extent to which its capabilities could be carried. Between the phrase
and the instrument, or group of instruments, the equality is perfect;
and independent of this power, made up equally of instinct and
knowledge, this composer shows a sense of orchestral color in combining
single instruments so as to form groups, or in the combination of
several separate groups of instruments by which he has produced the most
novel and beautiful effects--effects not found in other composers.
The originality and variety of his rhythms, the perfection of his
instrumentation, have never been disputed even by his opponents. In many
of his works, especially those of a religious character, there is a
Cyclopean bigness of instrumental means used, entirely beyond parallel
in art. Like the Titans of old, he would scale the very heavens in
his daring. In one of his works he does not hesitate to use three
orchestras, three choruses (all of full dimensions), four organs, and
a triple quartet. The conceptions of Berlioz were so grandiose that he
sometimes disdained detail, and the result was that more than one of his
compositions have rugged grandeur at the expense of symmetry and balance
of form.
Yet, when he chose, Berlioz could write the most exquisite and dainty
lyrics possible. What could be more exquisitely tender than many of
his songs and romances, and various of the airs and choral pieces
from "Beatrice et Benedict," from "Nuits d'Été," "Irlande," and from
"L'Enfance du Christ"?
Berlioz in his entirety, as man and composer, was a most extraordinary
being, to whom the ordinary scale of measure can hardly be applied.
Though he founded no new school, he pushed to a fuller development the
possibilities to which Beethoven reached out in the Ninth Symphony.
He was the great _virtuoso_ on the orchestra, and on this Briarean
instrument he played with the most amazing skill. Others have surpassed
him in the richness of the musical substance out of which their
tone-pictures are woven, in symmetry of form, in finish of detail; but
no one has ever equaled him in that absolute mastery over instruments,
by which a hundred become as plastic and flexible as one, and are made
to embody every phase of the composer's thought with that warmth of
color and precision of form long believed to be necessarily confined to
the sister arts.